Blindspot recap: Bone May Rot

Blindspot

type:

TV Show

Current Status:

In Season

tvpgr:

TV-14

seasons:

2

run date:

09/21/15

performer:

Jaimie Alexander, Sullivan Stapleton

broadcaster:

NBC

genre:

Drama, Mystery, Thriller

Blindspot returns this week with an edge-of-your seat episode, complete with crime puzzles, tension among the Scooby Gang, and more mystery behind Jane’s true identity. This week, Jane’s tattoos lead the team to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where they find some shady business has been occurring. We start with a flashback from two years ago, where a former deputy director at the CDC, named Walter, dies in an unfortunate accident in one of its super-secret BHL4 labs. Apparently, Walter’s suit had a tear in it, causing him to get contaminated with a deadly disease that made him react like King Joffrey when he was poisoned at his own wedding. (If you aren’t caught up on Game of Thrones, to quote Chris Hardwick at SDCC this year, “The world does not need to conform to your poor viewing habits.”)

Fast-forward to present day, and Patterson is making coffee with her boyfriend in her apartment and finds that her main squeeze has dug into her photos of Jane’s tattoos. She’s mad at first that he’s rooting around in her stuff (at least it wasn’t her cell phone — that’s a relationship felony), but she discovers that he’s been able to uncover one of the mysteries behind Jane’s leaf tattoo.

The tattoo appears to be a maple leaf, but Patterson argues that it’s an oak leaf. Her man points out that it’s actually both types of leaves, but where they overlap is where the true clue is hidden. It turns out, he was right. The clue looks like a specific logo: the CDC’s. The CDC headquarters sits on the corner of Oak and Maple street, thus showing the leaves’ significance. (I actually tried to look this up to see if this was actually a CDC location in real-life, but I’m directionally challenged and after two failed Google searches I gave up.)

This was a turning point in the show for me. The puzzles and the quirky boyfriend uncovering their mysteries is either extremely ridiculous, or widely clever — or both. This show is like an adult version of Pretty Little Liars. “A” always knows where the team is and is one step ahead of them; the clues and situations are ridiculous, but I can’t stop watching. I’m trying to uncover the mysteries along with the team while simultaneously trying to ignore Agent Weller covering up his real-life Aussie accent (he was way better this week though, right?).

Anyway, the team is greeted at the CDC by the new Deputy Director of Epidemiology, Rebecca Fine, and her counterpart and CDC military liaison, Frank. They are handed off to lab assistant Julie, who takes them into a screening before they can enter the facility. The super high-tech UV lights — ones that only the CDC has — reveal that Jane has UV tattoos on her face (ouch), all with numbers in a sequence that match the CDC’s lab specimens. The sequences are for the 10 most deadly diseases on the planet, all with no known cures.

Jane and Weller are taken into the same lab where Walter died to investigate further and discover that all of these diseases have been stolen. The CDC is then put on a two-hour lockdown, later named “a false alarm.” Rebecca is one of two people who has access to do this and is no longer in the building, and agents Reade and Zapata recognize the coincidence. They hack into her computer and see that she remotely triggered the lockdown.

Patterson discovers that every outbreak of the viruses taken happened at the same time Rebecca had traveled to the country with the outbreak, pointing all conspiracy to her. They find her husband’s location from his credit card use at a gas station, and when Rebecca and her clueless husband are cornered by police, she shoots both of them before they can even get out of the car.

Fortunately, there’s still time for the team to figure out what she did with the 10th strain, which is apparently the deadly cousin of Ebola. They track Rebecca’s movement to the Manhattan Cruise Terminal, and the pier is evacuated so the team can find whatever device Rebecca planted. Jane and Weller find an out-of-place bag, and the team has no time to wait for the CDC to contain it. With only minutes to figure out a plan, Weller calls Patterson to help him MacGyver his way into saving millions of people. They makeshift a containment device out of cleaning supplies (like I said, widely ridiculous but can’t stop watching), and the strain is contained before it’s released. Where they found enough Saran Wrap to make a military-worthy containment tent I don’t know, but hey — it’s entertaining.